Microbrewery would enliven Hays St. Bridge

Updated 12:06 am, Saturday, June 23, 2012

Photo: Kin Man Hui, San Antonio Express-News

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View of the city skyline from the Hays Street Bridge. Alamo Beer Company is proposing to build a brewery at 803 North Cherry Street. The city should learn a lesson from litigation involving land adjacent to the bridge.

View of the city skyline from the Hays Street Bridge. Alamo Beer Company is proposing to build a brewery at 803 North Cherry Street. The city should learn a lesson from litigation involving land adjacent to the

If you're looking for a fresh perspective on downtown San Antonio, I'd suggest a visit to the historic Hays Street Bridge, a high, broad walkway built more than a century ago on the near-East Side and renovated for nearly $4 million in 2010.

Seen from the bridge, the idiosyncratic skyline of the city spreads open to visitors in an up-close panorama of the Tower Life Building, Pearl Brewery and other beloved landmarks.

The view is there for those who come. On recent visits to the bridge, though, I saw just a few other people.

This raises a troubling question: If an inspiring view of downtown exists on the East Side and no one comes to see it, does anyone get inspired about downtown or the East Side?

More specifically, he wants them to come to his future microbrewery at a city-owned site beside the bridge, where a beer-garden restaurant would pick up the “prevailing breezes” as diners sit at tables on the bridge itself and enjoy the view.

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Simor intends to spend more than $7 million to develop the site, which now sits vacant in a blighted zone of industrial warehouses. The restored bridge is already showing signs of wear, including graffiti and busted lights.

But he envisions more than a world-class brewery designed by premier architects.

He sees the historic bridge, with the aid of his private dollars and some reasonable public incentives, transformed into “an elevated linear park” that attracts tourists, residents and more jobs to a part of the city historically neglected by officials and residents alike.

He cites other breweries, in Brooklyn and Denver, as accomplishing the same aim.

“They went to the wrong side of the tracks and built a brewery,” Simor said, “and as a result they have a vibrant community.”

The San Antonio Planning Commission and City Council have yet to sign off on making the land surplus and selling it to Simor.

But the “prevailing breezes” are good.

Supporters include District 2 Councilwoman Ivy Taylor, the Downtown Residents Association, the Dignowity Hill Neighborhood Association and San Antonio for Growth on the Eastside.

A recent snag at a Planning Commission meeting, therefore, qualifies as a true head-slapper.

The commissioners there nearly voted down the plan to make the land surplus and sell it to Simor.

Two of the commissioners voted against and four voted in favor of the plan, which needs five votes in favor to pass. One commissioner was recused and two were absent; so they agreed to postpone the vote to the next meeting on Wednesday.

A small contingent of activists continues to oppose the sale of the land to Simor.

Depending on whom you speak to, their reasons for doing so range from the paranoid to the thoughtful but misguided. In the interest of sanity and space, let's consider the latter.

“Our issue is that the bridge really needs open space around it to be appreciated,” says Gary W. Houston. “It's not so much the view from the bridge that's at issue, but the view to the bridge from surrounding streets.”

Houston and others are also upset that Simor would use part of the bridge to seat customers, even though full public access on and across the bridge would not be impeded.

“We're about to lose valuable public space, or at least redefine it,” Houston said.

But this public space needs to be redefined.

By allowing Simor to invest in his vision, the historic bridge and surrounding area will gain the sort of life and vibrancy that can only be achieved by the presence of something sorely lacking at present.